Tragedy troubling for the tough, too

Fire, police departments attend to their own in wake of traumatic stress

May 12, 2011|By Dan Parsons, dparsons@dailypress.com | 247-4712

GLOUCESTER — — The discovery of an emaciated child sitting in her own filth and kept in a cage in a single-wide trailer April 28 capped an emotionally and physically taxing month for the county's first responders.

Gloucester Sheriff's Office deputies spent much of the previous two weeks contending with the aftermath of a tornado that killed two county residents, destroyed homes and damaged a school.

The week after the young girl's parents were arrested and charged with murder in connection with the remains of another child buried in their back yard, Abingdon Volunteer Fire and Rescue medics and firefighters pulled a man they could not save from his burning house.

"These things can really compound on us when you've got one thing after another like that," said Abingdon VFD chief Herb Austin.

When tragedy strikes police officers, sheriff's deputies, medics and firefighters arrive on scene first and must internalize what they encounter. Indeed, it's often their job to drive into the morass while shielding the public from the graphic truth.

Lt. Scott Little, an investigator with the Gloucester Sheriff's Office and its public information officer, was searching a trailer on Carrie Lane on a relatively mundane burglary case when he discovered a little girl caged and neglected. The next day, deputies also had unearthed human remains in the yard of the same trailer.

Little declined an offer to share his immediate reaction to the scene and how it has affected him, saying the details were too graphic. The Sheriff's Office called in a third-party counselor to help all the deputies involved with the incident deal with the stress of witnessing such a horror.

The girl's parents, Brian and Shannon Gore, remain in jail and face murder and child abuse charges. A team of two to three medics from Austin's department drove the Gore's malnourished daughter to the Norfolk hospital where she is recovering.

Last week, he was gearing up for a visit from the Peninsulas EMS Council — a Gloucester-based organization that advocates for, trains and certifies first responders. PEMS sends Critical Incident Stress Management Teams to public safety agencies following everything from suicides to natural and man-made disasters. The organization also operates a 24-hour hotline for stress management assistance.

"I organized this one specifically in response to the house fire where the gentleman died," Austin said.

Austin said senior members will help the newer volunteers to monitor their reactions.

"Sometimes you get something like the tornado and we've got guys who have to be out there that have never seen what a tornado can do to a body," Austin said. "Our more experienced members will start to look at their moods and for any changes in behavior. After 30 or 40 years of this, we learn how to deal with things in our own ways."

The difficult part, Austin said, can be getting people to accept help, to open up about how they feel after events such as a fatal car accident.

"We stress that it's natural to be upset by some of these things. If it didn't bother someone, I'd be worried about that person," he said.

Austin said he lets members who responded to multiple events take some time off.

"We usually will take someone whose handled a lot of stuff like that out of rotation for a while," he said. "I'll just say 'Hey, turn your radio off for a week. We don't want to see you. Go have a beer.'"